In-Building Tech Speakers

 

 

Shawn R. Kelley,  Communications Specialist , City of Dallas Fire-Rescue Department

Shawn Kelley has served as a support staff member with Dallas Fire-Rescue since 1979. He is currently a Communications Specialist with the Department. In his communications staff role, Shawn is keenly aware of the technical challenges facing system administrators. As a certified firefighter, he has first-hand experience as an end user – relying on communication technology for his safety and effectiveness. Shawn also serves as a communications specialist on a federal urban search and rescue team and on a state urban search and rescue team.

Ron Scott, SVP Strategy & Real Estate Enterprise Network Solutions, ExteNet Systems

Ron Scott is the SVP of Strategy and Real Estate for Enterprise Network Solutions at ExteNet Systems. With a 30+ year background across real estate and technology infrastructure, Ron is chartered as the Chief Strategist and Architect of the Enterprise Communications Infrastructure (ECI) solution portfolio.  ECI is the advanced communications ecosystem serving Multi-tenant commercial office building owners, managers, and tenants. As part of this portfolio, Ron also works closely with the national carriers interested to deliver dark fiber solutions to these building owners and tenants.

Prior to ExteNet, Ron worked with multiple private equity firms as a board advisor for communication infrastructure companies and was a Group President/SVP Real Estate at XO Communications for 11 years. Ron was one of the pioneers in the in-building telecom infrastructure services starting one of the 1st Shared Tenant Telecom Services (STS) in Multi-Tenant Commercial office buildings with Trammell Crow Family.

Tim Danz, Chief Engineer, The California Center

Tim Danz is and has been the Chief Engineer of The California Center at 345 California St. for over 11 years. 345 Cal is a 50-story mixed-used high-rise in the Financial District managed by Cushman & Wakefield.

Tim began his career in high-rise engineering and operations at the historic Chrysler Building in NYC. He worked in five high-rises during his time in New York while attending school to acquire his New York City operator’s license.

Tim relocated to San Francisco in 1984 with Cushman & Wakefield and was part of the engineering team that commissioned the Citicorp Center at 1 Sansome St. Promoted to Chief Engineer in 1986, Tim was charged with opening 456 Montgomery Center where he applied his commissioning experience once again. In 1994, Tim took over as Chief at the Union Bank headquarters building at 350 California St. where he spent 13 years and was elevated to Senior Chief Engineer with charge of Union Banks three primary facilities in San Francisco and Oakland. He joined Cushman & Wakefield again in 2007 to take on The California Center

Ron Zimmer, CAE., President & CEO, Continental Automated Buildings Association (CABA)

Mr. Zimmer joined CABA in 1997 working with industry leaders who promote integrated systems and home/building automation throughout the world. CABA’s members include manufacturers, dealers, installers, service providers, energy utilities, builders, consultants, research organizations, publishers, educational institutions, governments, associations and content providers.

In addition to working closely with the CABA Board of Directors, Ron is actively involved with a number of industry committees/councils including the CABA Intelligent Buildings Council, CABA Connected Home Council, and represents CABA on the Automation Federation Board of Directors. He is also on the Advisory Board for IBcon, an intelligent buildings conference hosted by Realcomm. He is also on the Advisory Board of the International Federation for High Rise Structures 2019 Conference in Singapore. During AHR Expo, Ron was recently appointed to the 2018 ControlTrends Hall of Fame.

Dennis Rigney, Vice President of Sales, SOLiD

In his role as Vice President of Sales for SOLiD Americas, Dennis Rigney leads partner channel business development activities for The Americas. He possesses more than 16 years of experience in the wireless industry, with eight years focused in the Distributed Antenna Systems (DAS) market. Prior to joining SOLiD, Dennis held various sales management roles at Sprint/NEXTEL.

John Foley,  General Manager and Vice President Operations, Safer Buildings Coalition (SBC)

The primary mission of the Safer Buildings Coalition is to ensure that First Responders (Fire, Law Enforcement and EMS) can use state-of-the-art voice and data communications to communicate with one another inside buildings as well as to and from their Command Centers outside buildings during an event.

John has held key business development, operations, engineering, and executive roles at companies such as Level 3 Communications, MFS, and MCI. John was a co-founder of XO Communications where he was VP of Operations and Engineering, and later VP of International Network Development. John led dark fiber provider City Signal Communications in the position of President and CEO. John most recently served as Capture Director for specialty construction firm Henkels and McCoy, a leading DAS Integrator.

At H&M John led efforts for creating designs, workplans, budgets, and proposals for thousands of US based DAS, small cell, and public safety communications projects ranging from small-medium commercial buildings to mega-venues.

Ken Rehbehn, Founder & Principal Analyst, CritComm Insights

Founder and Principal Analyst Ken Rehbehn brings more than 30 years of experience tracking the IP-based technologies that shape society today. Combined with first-hand insight into the unique requirements of emergency service operations, CritComm Insights offers an ideal lens for evaluating the future technology advances for the emergency services.

 

As a wireless technology analyst, Ken tracks radio technology deployed to support mission critical agencies and enterprises. Offering a global perspective from his engagements in North America, Europe and Asia, he provides insight into ongoing and emerging trends, including 4G/LTE and 5G as well as Project 25 and TETRA Land Mobile Radio system (LMR) evolution. In his research, Ken tracks technology elements including radio access network (RAN) base stations, small cells, Distributed Antenna Systems (DAS), public safety communications devices and public safety IoT for Smart Cities.

 

Beyond his long tenure as an industry analyst, Ken’s years of experience as an emergency service worker brings deep insight into the operational realities encountered when agencies embrace technology. He began his career as a 9-1-1 dispatcher in Montgomery County, Maryland and served as an active fire fighter/EMT since the 1970s. His hands-on experience with trunked radio systems and public safety mobile data applications brings first-hand experience & understanding from the user’s point of view.

Billy Rowland, SMA, SMT Chief Engineer, Bank of America Plaza
Jeff Mucci, CEO & Head of Industry Insights, In-Building Tech, RCR Wireless News, & Enterprise IoT Insights

Over the past 20 years Jeff has been involved in many facets of running day-to-day operations for telecom, wireless, commercial real estate and energy services companies He has raised over $300 million of debt and equity for companies in which he has been involved. Previous roles include Chairman and CEO of ConnectSouth, a regional DSL company, President of a facilities based CLEC; and SVP Sales and Marketing for Clearwire. Jeff graduated from Clemson University with a degree in Financial Management and Real Estate

Donnie Kruse, Senior Manager Network Implementation, Verizon Wireless

Donnie Kruse is Senior Manager in Network Implementation at Verizon and helps manage over 3,000 Enterprise customers nationwide for In-Building projects. During his 14 year tenure, Donnie has tested and approved 3G/4G Radio Access Network elements for national roll-out with a focus on applying engineering concepts for optimization, procedures and maintainability. Donnie holds a BS in Information Technology.